The head of the Financial Supervisory Service urged banks and other financial institutions Tuesday to improve consumer welfare and avoid excessive lending. Choe Heung-sik, governor of the FSS, made the remarks earlier in the day during a meeting with representatives from banking and other financial industry lobby groups, the FSS said in a statement. During the meeting, Choe said some banks and ...

South Korean stocks traded almost flat late Tuesday morning on profit-taking, analysts said. The benchmark Korea Composite Stock Price Index inched down 0.22 point, or 0.01 percent, to 2,380.18 as of 11:20 a.m. On Monday (local time), US stocks declined, with the Dow Jones industrial average dropping 0.2 percent and the broad-based S&P 500 decreasing 0.2 percent. The tech-rich Nasdaq Composite ...

South Korean banks will donate 20 billion won ($17.7 million) to the organizing committee of the PyeongChang Winter Olympics to help the nation successfully host the quadrennial sports extravaganza, the Korea Federation of Banks said Tuesday. Besides the donation, banks will buy 1 billion won worth of tickets for the games, according to the federation. KEB Hana Bank, an official supporter of th...

South Korean stocks opened lower Tuesday, tracking overnight losses on Wall Street, analysts said. The benchmark Korea Composite Stock Price Index fell 7.14 points, or 0.3 percent, to 2,373.26 in the first 15 minutes of trading. Most large caps traded mixed, with market kingpin Samsung Electronics losing 1.72 percent and global chipmaker SK hynix shedding 2.78 percent. In contrast, leading ste...

South Korean companies' equity and debt sales plunged more than 24 percent in August from the previous month due mainly to one-off and seasonal factors, government data showed Tuesday. Local companies raised 10.9 trillion won ($9.6 billion) by selling stocks and bonds last month, down 24.4 percent from July, according to the data from the Financial Supervisory Service. Stock sales, including se...

Nearly half of the entire trade volume in South Korea’s stock market this year until mid-September stemmed from day trading, indicating individual traders’ growing tendency to seek instant profit from stocks with high price volatility, data showed Monday. From January to Sept. 15, day traders bought or sold some 48 percent of shares, or 89.5 billion shares, on the first-tier and second-tier mark...

South Korean stocks ended lower Monday as foreign investors and institutions sold local stocks amid escalating tensions between North Korea and the United States. The Korean won rose against the US dollar. The benchmark Korea Composite Stock Price Index lost 8.31 points, or 0.35 percent, to 2,380.40. Foreign investors offloaded shares worth more than 33.6 billion won ($29.6 million) and institu...

South Korean stocks traded lower late Monday morning as institutions offloaded large-cap stocks on profit taking. The benchmark Korea Composite Stock Price Index lost 9.47 points, or 0.40 percent, to 2,379.24 as of 11:15 a.m. Kim Ye-eun, an analyst at Cape Investment & Securities, said institutions sold large-cap stocks in apparent profit-taking, which are to blame for losses on the main bourse...

Stocks of solar energy-related stocks in South Korea traded sharply lower Monday on concerns that the United States may take safeguard measures against solar panels imported from China and other countries, analysts said. OCI, South Korea's top producer of polysilicon, had sunk 5.16 percent to 101,000 won ($89) on the Seoul bourse as of 9:55 a.m., and No. 2 player Hanwha Chemical Corp. was 6.6 pe...

South Korean stocks opened lower Monday as North Korea risks continued to weigh on the main index. The benchmark Korea Composite Stock Price Index lost 2.22 points, or 0.09 percent, to 2,386.49 in the first 15 minutes of trading. The decline came amid heightened tensions between North Korea and the United States. US Air Force B-1B Lancer bombers flew in international airspace off North Korea's...

The market value of South Korean biopharmaceutical maker Samsung BioLogics Co. surged during this year's stock rally and is forecast to further rise down the road thanks to its solid biosimilar business, market analysts said Sunday. Samsung BioLogics, a biopharmaceutical unit of South Korea's top conglomerate Samsung Group that was listed in November last year, bypassed all local pharmaceutical ...

Citibank Korea, the local branch of New York-based Citigroup, on Friday recommended current CEO Park Jin-hei as the sole candidate for the next term, officials said. Park is to assume his second term in office once his candidacy is confirmed at meetings of the board of directors and stockholders, both slated for next Wednesday. The top official joined Citibank Korea in 1984, after graduating fr...

Kospi, Kosdaq fall slightly, Samsung, SK hynix shares remain unfazed over tension

Samsung Pay is the most favored mobile payment system in South Korea, a survey showed Friday. The mobile payment service run by Samsung Electronics Co. received the highest 3.78 points on the 1 to 5 scale, according to the survey of 1,200 people by the Korea Consumer Agency. Naver Pay of South Korea's top Internet portal operator and Kakao Pay of South Korea's dominant messaging app KakaoTalk c...

The central bank said Thursday that the US Federal Reserve’s belt-tightening gesture should have a limited impact on Korea’s economy. “I do not think that the Fed’s decision will have a big impact on domestic financial markets,” Bank of Korea Gov. Lee Ju-yeol told reporters on the way to his office. The US central bank on Wednesday announced it will shrink its portfolio of bonds by $10 billion ...